


2.28 Thanksgiving in Gravity Falls

by William_Easley



Category: 2.28 Thanksgiving in Gravity Falls, Gravity Falls
Genre: Acceptance, F/M, Family, Forgiveness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-30
Updated: 2017-11-06
Packaged: 2019-01-26 17:12:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 19,761
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12562232
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/William_Easley/pseuds/William_Easley
Summary: November, 2014: Life goes on, but things change. Can Dipper and Mabel visit Gravity Falls with their parents over Thanksgiving--and keep things like Gnomes and monsters a secret? And what surprises do Stan and Ford have for everyone? And who's that yellow guy in the black top hat? Rest assured, there's a perfectly logical explanation.





	1. Through the Woods and Under the River

**Author's Note:**

> I do not own Gravity Falls or its characters, the property of the Walt Disney Company and Alex Hirsch. I write only for fun, because I love Alex Hirsch's creation and his people and, I hope, to entertain other fans; I make no money from my fanfictions.

**Thanksgiving in Gravity Falls**

**By William Easley**

**(November 17-30, 2014)**

* * *

 

**1\. Through the Woods and Under the River**

"I'm not at all sure about this," Ford said.

Stan laughed. "We're in the middle of nowhere, Poindexter! Who's gonna see me naked?"

"That's not the point! Stanley, it's _cold!"_

"Sixty degrees ain't cold," Stan said, stripping off his shorts. "It's bracing!" He pulled on his trunks and then started getting into his wetsuit. "Ugh, this thing's like a onesie!" He sat on the bank of the pool and got the legs started, then stood and pulled the suit up around him. "Good thing I went for the extra insulation. Help me with the sleeves."

It was November 17, and they had gone to the same beaver pond where Wendy, Dipper, and Mabel had begun their adventure in the old ghost town. Across from them, Ghost Falls tumbled over an out-thrust rock shelf and poured down into the pool. "OK," Stan said, stretching to adjust the fit of his diving suit. "Accordin' to the kids, there's a cave behind the falls. Should be a shelf of rock one, two feet under the water that I can climb on to get in. Help me with the tank and then I'll put on the mask and flippers and see what I can find. Got the bag and reel?"

"Right here," Ford said. "Are you sure you can carry that?"

"It's all in the legs and flippers, Ford! Look, I took the SCUBA lessons, OK? Now help me."

Reluctantly, Ford helped him suit up. Then, fully dressed and equipped, Stan waded duck-fashion into the scummy water. At the bank, the depth was about two feet, but a little way from shore there was a drop-off. Stan gave Ford a thumbs-up and muttered, "It's pretty damn cold, though," to himself. Then he put in the mouthpiece, stepped off and leaned forward, and started to kick.

It was awkward. The waterproof bag of equipment he’d strapped to his chest, but in his right hand he carried a reel of strong light cord. The mask didn't help much with visibility—the water was too churned-up, too full of mud particles, to let him see very far. But he kicked steadily, skirted the white water just beneath the falls, and found the ledge that Dipper had described. He scrambled up on it, removed the flippers, and holding them and the reel of line, he edged sideways until he saw the dark opening of the cavern.

He stepped inside and unreeled a few more feet of the line. The cave was flooded—a foot of water toward the falls—but the back part was reasonably dry. When he stepped out of the water, Stan unzipped the waterproof bag and took out a walkie-talkie. "Ya there?" he bellowed over the roar of the falls.

"I'm here," Ford said. "Are you all right?"

"Peachy," Stan said. With his free hand, he took out the powerful little flashlight and turned it on. "OK, I'm in the cave. I'm on dry rock now, but the front half is under a foot of water. There's stuff here, all right—pile of rotted wood, looks like some bags in the corner. Gonna check 'em out. You got the line secured?"

"Tied to a stake."

For five minutes Stanley rummaged around. Then he moved what looked like the remains of a knapsack and said, "Bingo! Ford, come in!"

"Yes, here. Are you in trouble?"

"Nope. OK, what I got is a little pile of gold nuggets. I'm gonna put 'em in one of the bags and then we'll see if we can get 'em across."

"Understood. Hurry. It's cold, and—"

"Yeah, yeah, we'll just do the one bag. We can come back in the spring when the weather warms up."

Holding the flashlight between his teeth (real, not dentures—his had grown back in since he drank from the Fountain of Youth), Stan scooped the nuggets up and put them into a tough triple-canvas bag. He estimated that the little hoard came to somewhere between eight and twelve ounces. "Coulda carried this out," he muttered, but they'd wanted to test their system.

He carefully fastened the bag—it had a double closure—and then hooked it onto the line with a cinch carabiner. He waded back into the water until he stood a few feet behind the falls. Again, he shouted into the walkie-talkie to be heard: "Ford! Haul it in. I'll unreel."

"All right. Ready?"

"Take it away."

Stanley paid out the line as Ford, on shore, hauled it in hand over hand. The bag went into the water, beneath the falls, and more and more line went out. Then the movement stopped, and Ford said, "I have it."

"Yeah, there's only about thirty feet of line left. Haul all that in and we'll coil it up. That way I won't have to carry it with me on the way back. I'll get the flippers and mask on and be there in a minute."

Stan repacked everything in his chest pack, put on his gear, checked the air regulator. Then, leaving only the line spool behind, he edged out behind the falls and kicked his way over to the bank, where Ford helped him climb out. "We should have had a campfire going," Ford said, handing Stanley some oversized towels.

"Nah, don't want to leave evidence that we've been here," Stan said. He toweled off—the air felt warm after the water—and hurriedly dressed. "That's better! How much do you think?"

"I don't know," Ford said. "Probably less than a pound."

"Let's go," Stan said. "We'll check it out."

It was a four-mile hike back to Ford's car, and that warmed Stan up even more. As they started back to Gravity Falls, Ford said, "Even if that's real gold, I'm not sure we can keep it."

"Of course, we can!" Stan said. "I got the permit from the Department of State Lands! For all anybody knows, we found that stuff by panning in creek beds. And we did recover it from a waterway, you know. Totally legit, practically."

* * *

It wasn't an enormous gold strike—as they found out when they got back to the McGucket house and used a pan balance, it weighed out to 10.21 Troy ounces—but it was real gold, the quality was good, and it would bring in enough funds, as Stan said, "to go back in the spring and loot the place."

"That may be all the old miner left," Ford told him.

Stan shrugged. "Eh, I'm pretty sure there's probably more under the water in the cave, but even if there's nothing left, it'll still be fun looking. You gotta try skin-diving, Ford! It's a kick."

"I'll think about it," Ford said in a voice that hinted he wouldn't.

"Yeah, and then maybe we can look at your photos of the maps showin' where the Spanish galleons went down and maybe take a Caribbean trip to poke around in the ocean. We could go far if we found one."

"How so?" Ford asked.

"Well, they got like six thousand miles to the galleon," Stan said. "Hah!"

"Very amusing," Ford told him. "And I suppose there's sunken treasure yet to be found, but we don't really need all the money in the world, you know."

"Hey," Stan said, "give me my dreams!"

* * *

On Wednesday morning, they ate breakfast in Greasy's, and as they got up to leave, Stan slipped a fifty-dollar bill under his empty coffee cup.

As the twins reached the door, behind them Lazy Susan yelled, "Hey, Stanley! Ya forgot something!"

Stan grinned back at her. "Nah, that's your tip," he said.

"But the check was just fourteen bucks!"

"It's to make up," he said, "for all the times I stiffed ya."

People in the diner laughed and Lazy Susan was so surprised that her other eye opened. "Well—thank you!"

It was a good thing Ford and Stan hadn't waited a couple of days before taking their prospecting expedition—Wednesday had dawned with a gray overcast sky, the temperature had fallen steadily the whole night before, and at 8:00 in the morning a light snowfall sifted down. "I'd hate to be swimmin' today," Stan said.

"I hope you didn't catch cold," Ford told him as they reached the Stanleymobile.

Stan unlocked the doors. "I'm fine, Ford. Long as I didn't catch some weird beaver disease. I'm more likely to come down with something today—it's gotta be thirty degrees, and me without my heavy coat!"

"Let's get home and warm up," Ford said, climbing into the passenger seat of the El Diablo.

In the car, Stan smiled and said, "'Nother few days and they'll all be piling in for Thanksgiving."

Ford said in a brooding voice, "I'm still worried about how the twins' mom and dad will react to Gravity Falls."

"Meh," Stan said as he started the engine, "we'll cross that bridge after we burn it."


	2. A Few Small Confessions

**2: A Few Small Confessions**

* * *

**(Saturday, November 22, 2014)**

Confession, they say, is good for the soul. Ford and Stan, for reasons of their own, had agreed that confessions were in order. However, anyone who has a lick of sense will confess when the person they're confessing to is in a nice mood.

No one ever accused the Pines twins of being lickless, sense-wise.

Accordingly, that Saturday evening in November, Stanford and Stanley double-dated—Ford and his fiancée, Lorena Jones, and Stan and his, Sheila Remley—driving over to Portland, where the weather was considerably balmier than in Gravity Falls on the other side of the mountains, for a meal in a trendy (and expensive, but never mind that) Italian restaurant on 30th Street.

It was a cozy place, the back room equipped with leather-lined booths that gave a sense of privacy. In making the reservation, Stanford insured that the privacy was a little more complete—he had arranged to rent out the entire room for an hour and a half for a private party.

The headwaiter seemed a bit surprised that the private party consisted of just four people, but discreetly accepting a fifty-dollar tip from Stanford, he somehow contained his astonishment and turned them over to a waiter and a wine water. These two suggested choice selections from the menu, pushed the specials, and tactfully changed Stan's wine suggestion from "Some of that red stuff" to a very fine Barolo, exquisite in aroma and taste.

As they waited for their entrees, with his eyebrows raised inquiringly, Ford glanced at Stan and Stan nodded in confirmation. So, after more than one and not as much as too many glasses of wine, Ford took a little black cubic jewel box from his jacket pocket. "Lorena," he said, taking her hand, "this is the ring I promised. Thank you for agreeing to be my wife."

He slipped the engagement ring on her finger, and she gasped. "It's so beautiful!" The stone was at least two carats, and even in the candlelight at the table, it sparkled in a whole prism of colors, far more enchantingly than any other diamond they had ever seen.

Sheila _oohed_ and _ahhed_ , and then with a grin, Stan took a matching box from his own pocket. "Sheila, you already accepted my family heirloom ring, and I wouldn't replace that. But I couldn't let my Brainiac brother pull somethin' like this and not match him! So—here's the twin stone for you, in a simple necklace."

It was, you could say, simple—simple platinum, the chain gleaming in the light and supple as silk to the touch. Sheila's gemstone nested in a buttercup setting that emphasized the flashing spears of multicolored light radiating from it. "Is this even a diamond?" Sheila asked, dangling it from her palm. "It's so brilliant!"

Ford and Stan glanced at each other again, and the Ford cleared his throat and said, "Well, we have a confession to make. Yes, these  _are_  diamonds, but not the ordinary sort. These stones are Rhidicollite, a crystalline form of carbon, just like run-of-the-mill diamonds, but formed under immensely different conditions. The fractal structure of most diamond crystals is octahedral, but these are hexadecagonal."

Lorena nodded gravely and then said, "I don't know what that means." 

Sheila, her eyes wide, said, "I do. Sixteen-sided, not eight-sided. That must be why they're so much brighter than ordinary diamonds." Sheila had been a physics major.

Sheila turned for Stan, and he fastened the necklace for her, tugging to make sure the catch had securely closed. He said, "Yeah, yeah, sixteen, eight, whatever, all's I know is they're beautiful, to match you."

Sheila ran her fingers down the delicate chain, smiled and kissed him and then said to Lorena, "What did I tell you? The man's a con artist!"

" _A_  con artist?" Stan asked, chuckling. "Babes, I am  _the_  con artist!"

"Wait a minute. These Rhidicollite crystals  _can't_  occur naturally," Lorena said.

"No," Ford agreed. "I found them—well, you'll know sooner or later, so let me complete the confession. This is highly confidential, you understand, ladies. I found the matrix stone from which these were cut many years ago on a crashed alien ship in Gravity Falls Valley."

"A crashed alien—you mean a spaceship?" Lorena asked, her voice excited. "That is so intriguing! There was a spaceship in Gravity Falls?"

"Oh, it's still there—if you know just where to look," Ford said. "In fact, I still visit it now and again."

"Maybe you can take me to see it," Lorena suggested. 

Squirming and rubbing the back of his neck, Ford said, "Well—it can be a little bit dangerous for someone who's never been there before, but—we'll see."

"Is this from a whole different planet?" Sheila asked, admiring her necklace.

"It could be," Ford said. "The aliens, from everything I can discover, were great collectors, taking artifacts, samples, and even specimens from thousands of different worlds. So, yes, the mineral is very likely from a strange planet far out in the cosmos. The Rhidicollite, among other properties, is nearly twice as hard as other diamonds."

"Yeah, and the only way they could be cut," Stan said as he poured Lorena a second glass of wine, "was with a kinda super-powerful laser beam that Ford also conveniently found on the ship."

"Um—not quite," Ford said, holding up his right forefinger. "I found the  _components_ and assembled a laser from them. Again, the heart of it is a unique gemstone quite unknown on Earth. Quite recently, Dr. McGucket was able to use the laser to shape the crystals into these gems for us."

"To cut to the chase, these dinglebats are the rarest of the rare," Stan said. "Only two ridiculamawhoozits on Earth!"

"I hope they're insured!" the practical Lorena said.

"Oh, yeah, yeah, out the wazoo," Stan replied with a grin. "We took care of that!"

And they had. A week earlier, Stanley had phoned a very old friend and distant cousin of his—a fellow who lived in Philly and whose business interests were all one hundred per cent completely and very nearly legitimate these days, but who still had a good many shady acquaintances.

Once Stan had explained the situation—"Mazel tov, Stanny!" the voice on the phone said—the old man chuckled. "Stanny, ya got nothin' to worry about. I'll get the word out. No punk thief in his right mind would target you and your brother, and take it from me, the big-time operators will leave you and your ladies strictly alone."

Of course, to supplement the word on the underworld grapevine, Ford had also bought more mundane insurance for both gems—to the tune of a million dollars each, since the best appraiser in the country when faced with the two identical stones had all but burst into tears before giving up at "At least a million apiece!"

The diners had to cut short their discussion as two waiters brought their food in, steaming and smelling terrific. Then they had to decide on extra Parmesan or no, had to decline a second order of breadsticks, and had to assure the headwaiter that everything looked good. And finally, they could eat.

Over the meal, they turned from aliens and such to talk about some practical considerations. "For the time being," Ford told Lorena and Sheila, "Fiddleford and Mayellen say we can continue to live with them in the old Northwest house. However, both Stanley and I believe it's our responsibility as, well, married men, to provide you with homes of your own."

Stanley rolled his eyes. "Always a lecture! Gals, whattaya think about living near the Shack?" Stan asked, his voice showing his excitement. "Not _in_  it, mind you!"

Lorena smiled immediately. "I'd love it! Soos and Melody are so nice—they'd be great neighbors!"

And Sheila took Stan's hand. "Honey, that's fine with me, too. But—won't we crowd them?"

"Nah," Stan said with a laugh. "When Ford bought the land, it was right at 700 acres. I've been addin' onto that over the years—land's cheap up that way, not least because a lotta people in the Valley think it's cursed. It ain't really though. At least, I think the curse is off since all the undead jerks have been put to rest. Anyways, today between us, Ford and me own—what is it, Ford?"

"Twenty-seven hundred acres, give or take a few," Ford said. "That's a bit over four square miles of property. Stanley and I have talked about it—we could build houses on Gopher Road, closer to town than the Shack, but on the same side of the road. Each lot would run to about ten acres and Cold Creek would back onto them. Very scenic. Our driveways would lead back through a fine stand of pines to a great level, grassy meadow, where we'd build. We wouldn't be so close that we'd be in each other's pockets, but it would be just a short walk from one house to the other—or up the hill to the Shack, where I plan to keep my lab."

"So whattaya think?" Stan asked. "Either of you don't like it, it's off."

"It sounds great to me," Lorena said. "That's such a nice, quiet part of the valley."

"Actually—" Ford started.

Stan cut him off: "Yeah, real peaceful.  _Real_ quiet!" Ford shrugged and smiled.

"Could we go look at the land?" asked Sheila. "I'm sure I'll like it, but now I'm excited to see the view!"

"Oh, sure. You gals want to go out there tomorrow afternoon?" Stan asked. "S'posed to be partly sunny and warmer, the weatherman says."

"It's a date!" Lorena said, and Sheila squeezed Stan's hand in agreement.

"Now, as to the style of house—" Ford began.

"Ours  _has_  to be a log house!" Sheila said, all but bouncing in her seat like Mabel on a sugar high. "I'd want it to match the look of the Mystery Shack if possible!"

"Hey, right," Stan said. "That'll be easy. We'll get Manly Dan to put together a construction crew. He's a hell of a good contractor, ya know! We can tap into the city water line, run underground electrics so's as not to mess up the view, and you can decide exactly where on the lot you'd like the house to be."

"Mr. Corduroy built the Shack originally," Ford said. "Of course, it was originally just my house, and he was Boyish Dan back then. How about you, Lorena? Maybe a nice brick Tudor or—"

She tapped him on the arm. "None of that! You know I always wanted a log house, too," she said. She caught her breath sharply and looked away.

Ford shifted uncomfortably. He had momentarily forgotten that Lorena's first husband had been planning to build a log house up in the mountains when he'd been stricken down by a fatal heart attack. "Well—yes, I'd like that, too. If you're really sure," he said softly.

She turned back, tears gleaming in her eyes, but smiling. "I wouldn't have it any other way," she said in a quiet, firm tone. "It would be like an old promise fulfilled."

And so, matters were settled, and they had a little more wine, lots of good food, and lots of laughter. In fact, afterward Stan and the ladies were all just a wee bit tipsy, but Ford, always abstemious, had drunk only two small glasses of the wine, and they walked around Portland for an hour or so as the effects of those wore off until he said he was perfectly OK to drive.

" _That's_ a matter of opinion," Stan growled. Though Ford's driving skills had come back and improved over the past couple of years, Stan still distrusted Ford's habit of falling into a lecture and, turning to face his audience in the car, failing to notice a deer or a freight train crossing the road just ahead.

However, they made it safely back. Later, close to midnight in Gravity Falls, they parked at a scenic lookout—not to make out, as two teenage couples might have done, but to finish their talk.

An autumn chill had settled over the Valley, and they sat close together, Ford and Lorena in front, Stan and Sheila in the back seat, keeping each other warm. The night had that startling crisp clearness that comes along in November, when the humidity is low and the stars shine undimmed. There was no moon, and above them they could see constellations: Ford pointed out Orion, Pegasus, and Cassiopeia, and told them where to look to catch sight of the Andromeda galaxy, about two-thirds of the way from Cassiopeia and Pegasus. And then the windows began to fog up.

For a while the astronomy lesson was suspended. And then, from where he snuggled in the back seat with Sheila, Stan said, "Poindexter, better tell 'em the rest of it. We decided, and you said you wanted to break it to them 'cause you're more diplomatic than me."

"All right," Ford said, nervously drumming his six-fingered hands on the steering wheel. "This is the last thing. We both hope it won't change your minds or anything, but—well, if it does, then we'll understand."

"Yeah, and you can keep the stones," Stan said. "But we've got something else to confess."

"What is it?" Sheila asked. She and Stan were holding hands.

"Go ahead. You said you'd tell 'em, Ford," Stanley said.

"All right." Stanford cleared his throat. "Everyone in town has noticed the changes in Stanley and me these past couple of months," he said. "We've told you we went to a special spa in Florida, and that's partly true, but mostly, well, a lie."

"Yeah, see, it's _sorta_  true 'cause the word 'spa' basically means a mineral spring. One that's supposed to give ya good health and vitality, blah blah blah."

Ford overrode his brother: "We, well, found—there's no other way to say it, I'm afraid—we found the Fountain of Youth."

"Really?" Lorena asked, sounding interested but not particularly surprised. She had grown up in Gravity Falls.

"Really," Stan said. "The owner gave us just a little sample of the water, and we kinda-sorta promised not ever to ask for any more of the stuff. But—well, Stanford and I both drank it, and a couple weeks ago we both went to the doctor for a check-up."

"He puts our somatic ages at approximately forty-eight to fifty years old," Ford said. "He says we're in exceptional shape for men close to seventy."

"To sum up, we got back close to twenty years of our lives," Stanley said. "Funny thing, we each felt like the other one deserved to get back thirty years, see, 'cause that's how long Ford was lost in weird dimensions and how much time it took for me to figure a way to get him back. I guess it's impossible to judge the right amount of water for that, so the guy is generous and gives us enough for about forty years—"

"Wait," Sheila said. "So—what? You actually got younger? It's permanent?"

Ford said, "Well, we're aging again, of course, but at a normal rate. And it's complicated. We didn't lose memories—it doesn't affect the mind, evidently—but yes, our bodies are in effect between seventeen and twenty years younger than our chronological ages."

"Hope that ain't a deal-breaker," Stanley put in.

Ford continued, "The main thing is, we started to feel strange about asking you ladies to marry us because we were so much older than you were."

"But now," Stan said, "we got a shot at livin' out a normal married life with you, 'stead of checkin' out as dried-up old guys in ten, twenty years or so. So—is this a deal breaker?"

Both women laughed. "You big silly!" Lorena said, giving Ford a fond little shove. "Of  _course_ it isn't. Ford, I'd marry you in a heartbeat if you were ten years _older_ instead of nearly twenty years younger than when we first met! And now we just about match!"

"Same goes for me," Sheila said, nuzzling Stanley's neck. "But I have to say—hope I don't embarrass you, Stanley—I prefer you the way you are right now, with a little more youthful, ah, let's say vigor!"

"Hot tamales!" Stanley exclaimed before kissing her.

"Now," Lorena said from the front seat, next to Ford, "I think the very next thing we ought to do is for Ford to drop you and Sheila off at your place—and then for him and me to go back to _my_  place. And we won't see you until tomorrow morning at breakfast. A  _late_  breakfast!"

"Make it  _brunch,"_ Ford said, hugging her.

And, as it turned out, that was just fine for Stanley and Sheila, too.


	3. No Place like the Falls for the Holidays

**3: No Place Like the Falls for the Holidays**

* * *

 

It was Fiddleford's idea: the best way to announce the engagements of the elder Pines twins to Dipper and Mabel's folks was to do it a real old-fashioned Thanksgiving family get-together. His wife Mayellen agreed that of all possible places, their home—the old Northwest mansion—was the most ideal.

 Stanford wasn't so sure. "Maybe we should take our ladies to Piedmont instead. Our nephew and his wife have never experienced Gravity Falls weirdness before," he pointed out.

 "Weirdness?" Fiddleford asked in puzzlement as he vacuumed up a thick spattering of gooey ectoplasm that had curdled the floor of his lab. "I haven't seen any weirdness to speak of in ages! Oh, slap down that there poltergeist behind you, please. They're more trouble than a drunk carp at a hoedown!"

 Stanford had been wielding the cricket bat, which had been charmed against lesser apparitions and specially imported from a school of magic in Scotland. He spun, saw the globular creature—a little like an airborne green-and-pink jellyfish, a little like the photos of President Taft in his most bloated period—and gave it a sharp smack with the enchanted weapon.

 The mindless apparition splatted onto the floor, and Fiddleford ran the shop vac over the remains, sucking up the gelatinous mess. "Dang troublemakers," he muttered.

 He glanced around. The lab floor was clean, and no more mischief-making semi-sentient sprites were drifting around. "OK, they'll just reform iffen I don't get shed of 'em, so I'll empty this here canister into the Bottomless Pit. But speakin' of your worries, I'll tell you what, Ford: Thanksgiving ain't normally a time for strangeness hereabouts. Seems like all the ghoulies and ghosties and long-underwear wearin' apparitions take some time off around then. The Manotaurs have their Preparing for Winter week, when they haul leaves and twigs into their cave so's they can snuggle down on them cold days. The Gnomes are comin' out of the trees and goin' down into their hereditary-like burrows, where it's warmer, an' they're layin' in supplies of dried fruits, roadkill, and whatever they can steal. Ain't seen a vampire bat nor a dinosaur in months."

 "Well," Ford said slowly, "as long as we don't make them think this is a town of supernatural strangeness and weird characters."

 "Aw, shucks, we can deal with that! We'll put Mr. and Mrs. Pines up here in one of the nice bedrooms on the third floor, the kids can use their regular spare rooms on the second. I'll have the Willets come in to cook us up a good old-fashioned feast, and we'll show 'em the more normal sights around the county an' steer clear of any supernaturdoodle hullabullusions."

 Ford still felt uncertain, but unlike his brother, Stanley was all for the idea. So were Wendy, who worked only weekends and two evenings a week in the Shack during the school year, and Teek, who still showed up as short-order cook on weekends only—because they'd get to see Dipper and Mabel, respectively.

 Mayellen, Fiddleford's wife, now almost totally recovered from the trauma she'd suffered when an alien creature had kidnapped her and held her prisoner for years, said she would really enjoy company for a change—they rarely had guests, and she now was more comfortable among people and wanted to see new faces. Stanley's fiancée, Sheila Remley, and Stanford's, Lorena Jones, were eager to break the news of their upcoming nuptials.

 Soos and Melody were overjoyed. "It'll be like Christmas at Thanksgiving, dawgs!" Soos pronounced. "Little Soos loves those kids! And we can also tell everybody our big surprise, too! It's like the greatest idea since I hired Gideon to be the Dancing Wolf Boy!"

 In the end, they all convinced Stanford, and at the beginning of the second week in November, Stanley phoned and made arrangements with Mr. and Mrs. Pines.

Alex Pines, the twins' dad, was delighted. His wife Wanda was just a little perturbed: "But I have my checklist for Thanksgiving all ready!"

 Mabel and Dipper weren't supposed to know about the offer, but Mabel had eavesdropped and knew everything, so the twins wheedled, and before long Mom gave in. Though the Mystery Twins were fifteen now, they had never lost the wheedling instinct that had served them well since they had been toddlers.

 "Oh, very well," Mrs. Pines said finally, with a resigned smile. "If it means so much to you two, we'll go—well, thank heavens I haven't bought the turkey yet!"

 "Yay!" Mabel exclaimed. "Mom, you're the best! Dad, you're the best, too! Dipper, I'm used to you!"

 Over Mr. Pines's admittedly mild objections—as an IT specialist he made good money, but the Pines family had recently purchased a larger house, and they were not exactly rich—Stanley arranged to get them round-trip airline tickets—first class!—for Wednesday, November 26.

 The kids were out of school for that whole week—as were Wendy and Teek in Gravity Falls—and if everything went according to plan and there were no airport delays, the Pines family would arrive in Portland at about nine-thirty on Wednesday morning. Someone would meet them and drive them to Gravity Falls—and they should be there before noon. They'd stay until the following Sunday.

Immediately the kids let their special friends know to expect them.

Wendy texted Dipper:  _Dude, I'm super stoked! It will be sooooo good to see you again! Hey, I found these great peppermints I think you'll really like!_

 He texted her: _Ford says he likes my book! He's talking to an agent about it and may have some news for me when we get there! I've got two new songs I want to play for you! But before anything else—I want to sample that peppermint! See you in two weeks! With loads of you-know-what!_

Mabel texted T.K. O'Grady:  _Get ready for some world-class smoochies! I have been saving so many of them up for you!_

Teek texted Mabel:  _I've started taking vitamins! Can't wait to snuggle with you! Wish I could spend the Thanksgiving feast with you, but my family's doing its usual celebration. I'll sneak away around three o'clock, though. Meet you at Circle Park?_

 It was looking good.

 Except during the next days, Stanford still worried incessantly. Stanley assured him, "Look, there's been nothing unusual since Halloween, Ford. I got a feeling we're gonna coast through this. You'll impress Alex and Wanda, I'll joke with him and charm her, and we'll give 'em the happiest Thanksgiving they've had in years and surprise everybody with the wedding announcement!"

 "I have to tell Ma—I mean Dipper, about—the problem," Ford said. Stanley usually objected when he used Dipper's birth name, Mason. "He's got to know. He's tied in with this, and he was the one who figured out the secret behind the name Dunn Bergas."

 "So tell him," Stanley said. "You know this Bill Cipher a lot better than anybody. All's I know is I had him in my head, and I got a kinda hazy recollection of this weird nacho-chip thing wearin' a Mr. Peanut hat, but that's about it. When you wiped my brain, I think my memory of him is the only thing I never recovered, and I don't want to. Speakin' of memory, I just recalled you owe me a hundred and fifty bucks, your half of the car rental."

 "I really don't think a limousine is necessary," Ford grumbled. "You have the El Diablo, I've got my Lincoln, and they're very nice cars."

 "We don't want to crowd 'em!" Stanley said. "And anyhow, the kids' mom is the one we gotta impress. Wanda's a nice lady, but she's all about plans and schedules and aimin' for success, yada yada. If she thinks we've—" he hooked his fingers into air quotes—" _arrived,_ it'll make the holiday more fun, and also it'll make her feel better about the kids visitin' us here so often."

 "Well, we _have_  arrived," Ford pointed out. "We're both comfortably well-off! But I foresee one problem. She's going to notice we're younger."

 Their visit to the Fountain of Youth had not quite brought them all the way back to the point they had been when they lost thirty whole years of their lives—because of the Portal accident—but according to Ford's doctor, they were in incredible shape for men nearing seventy.

He put Ford's apparent somatic age at no more than fifty to fifty-two, and though Stanley hadn’t asked his own doctor to do as specific an estimate, he was obviously about the same. Stan had lost much of his gut, his hair had darkened, the bumps on his nose had almost cleared up (he and Stanford looked more nearly identical than ever), and he had no pain in his knees and more energy than he'd had in years. 

"Also," he had recently told Stanford, "I gotta change my eyeglass prescription. These are too strong now, and the ophthalmologist says I got a spontaneous combustion of my cataracts."

"Remission, I think you mean, Stanley," Ford had corrected.

"Whatever, they're gone. And I don't think my early memories have been affected. Fr'instance, remember that time in second grade when we spent all day as each other?"

"I remember the note they sent home telling Ma what a bad boy I’d been," Ford muttered. "That poor class hamster!"

But, as to the problem of age, Stanley said, "I don't think Wanda will be thrown for a loop. Alex probably won't even notice. Sheila an' Lorena will back us up and tell ‘em we went to a spa and got great results! We'll give the kids' mom the same story, and I'll make her believe it. I got my ways, you know." He waggled his (darker now) eyebrows.

"I need to tell you this, though, before they come up," Stanford said a little reluctantly. "I won't involve Dipper more than necessary, but he's the one who can contact Bill Cipher in the Mindscape. I can't—this plate in my head. Oh, when I'm sleeping, Cipher can affect my dreams—or I think he can, though I haven't dreamed of him since Weirdmageddon ended—but he hasn't been in touch with me. I have to know more about him and his motives and how he manages to manifest in our reality, even though such manifestations appear to be very temporary."

"Ya gonna drag Dip out to that statue, huh?" Stanley asked, frowning. "I knew I shoulda had that thing hauled over to the Bottomless Pit an' dumped!"

"If I didn't take Dipper there, he'd just go on his own," Ford said. "This way, I can be his—wingtip? Is that the word?"

"Yeah," Stan said with an evil grin. "You go be his wingtip!"

"While Dipper puts himself in relaxation mode and tries to get in touch with Bill—he's good at that—I'll keep watch. If it looks as if he's in trouble, I have ways of pulling his consciousness safely out of the Mindscape. But I  _have_  to know—have to hear from Cipher himself—and the only way I can think to do it is through Dipper."

"Just keep him safe, Ford," Stanley said. "That's all I ask."

"I will," Ford said. "He means a lot to me."

 "To all of us," Stanley said. "To all of us."


	4. We Gather Together

**4: We Gather Together**  

The Pines family, Mom and Dad still a little awed by their first-ever flight in a first-class cabin, headed into the jetway, Mabel bounding along ahead of everyone else. Dipper trundled her carry-on bag as well as his—she usually stuck him with the chore—but hurried as fast as he could.

 She had finally paused just inside the terminal and was looking around. "Where are they?"

 "They will be at Baggage Return," Dipper said patiently, enunciating each word, "exactly as they told us. They can't come to the gate—Security, remember?"

The plane had disembarked the passengers at Gate C23, about as far as possible from Baggage Return. If left to her own devices, Mabel would have run full-tilt down the long turquoise-carpeted concourse (taking advantage of the moving walkways for the sake of added speed) to find their Grunkle Stan.

 Mom, however, cautioned: "You don't want to get there and be grounded, young lady!"

 "Poop, heck, darn," Mabel muttered at that level of audibility that every fifteen-year-old knows—just barely under the parental radar. But she slowed down.

 In honor of the occasion, she was wearing a new version of her classic shooting-star sweater—knitted larger to make up for her growth (both in height and bust). Though she'd taken to wearing braids in school, she had gone back to her old hairstyle, too, just a tiny bit shorter than it had been, with a shocking pink headband that matched her sweater.

 Dipper was wearing a trapper's hat—which earned him a few amused glances—plus a long-sleeved bronze-red corduroy shirt (one guess as to why he had picked it out in the store), a cargo vest over that, a small backpack, jeans, and black sneakers. As they tramped along, everyone except Mabel dragging a rolling bag (or two), their mom said, "Now, before we go out, I want you to each take a warm jacket from the suitcase we checked! It's a lot colder here than at home!"

 "Mo-om," Mabel said, giving it the two-syllable approach, "we've been here when there's been two feet of  _snow_  on the ground, remember?"

 "It's still cold," her mother told her. "The pilot said the air temperature is only forty-two degrees!"

 They finally made the whole length of the concourse, then went down two levels to Baggage Return.

 And Dipper's heart took off faster than a jet leaving the runway. "There's Wendy!"

 The tall redhead was smiling and waving. Mabel said, "Wah-wah-wow! She's all dressed up!"

 Which she was—a green sweater (Dipper saw it was the one Mabel had knitted in a plaid-flannel pattern), skinny black jeans, and new-looking brown suede boots with a probably-faux dark-brown fur collar. And her gorgeous red hair had been carefully tended, though she didn't wear braids, as she had before when meeting the twins' parents—it gleamed and billowed.

 The Pines family crowded toward her. "Hello, Mrs. Pines!" Wendy said, giving her a hug. "You look so good! Mr. Pines, how are you, sir?"

 Dad chuckled. "You don't have to call me 'sir!' Alex will do just fine. How's that car of yours?"

 "Tip-top shape!" Wendy said enthusiastically. "Just finished the last of the bodywork last month, got a new paint job—still forest-green, though—and replaced the headlights because the old lenses were so oxidized! I'll let you drive it when we get to the Falls."

 "Oh," Mr. Pine said, sounding disappointed. "You're not driving us?"

 "No, I just came along for the ride," Wendy said. "Stanley will be doing the driving honors. Hey, Mabel! Hi, Dipper! You guys have grown some more on me since last September!"

 They both hugged her at the same time. Wendy put the palm of her left hand against Dipper's neck during the hug and their contact telepathy kicked in:  _Is this still workin', Dip?_

 — _Yeah, it is! Loud and clear, Magic Girl!_

  _Great! I can sit beside you and we'll talk this way on the drive out!_

 "Dear!" Mrs. Pines said, "There's our bag on the carousel! Quick!"

 Wendy broke the hug and said, "Which one?"

 "The big brown leather—wow!" Dad said as Wendy dashed over and easily swung it off the conveyor. "Better let me, that's got winter coats and things and it's heavy."

 "I've got it," Wendy said cheerfully. "My dad's a lumberjack, remember? I'm used to carrying great big trunks of trees! This the only checked bag?"

 "That's it!" Alex Pines told her.

 She led them out of the terminal and across to the parking lot. Dipper was looking around for the Stanleymobile—but there stood Stan, looking somehow different and nattily dressed in a three-piece suit— _Didn't even know he owned one!—_ and grinning beside a — _white limousine?_

 "I'm your chauffeur for today," Stan announced, shaking hands with the twins' dad. "Hey, Alex, you and the Mrs. look terrific! Wendy, I'll get that. Let me pop the trunk."

 "Grunkle Stan!" Mabel had been standing with her mouth open. "You—you look so—you're so, uh, fit!"

 "Been taking care of myself," he said. "Hiya, Pumpkin! Dipper, you still keeping up with the track?"

 "JV team captain," Dipper said.

 "Attaboy!"

 Stan swung all the bags into the car trunk—"No need to dig out the coats, Wanda," he said, short-stopping Mrs. Pines from unlatching the big suitcase. "This baby has a fantastic air-handling system!" He opened the back door. The limo had facing seats, two forward, two back. "So, who wants to ride up front with me?" he asked.

 "Me! Me-me-me!" Mabel yelled, causing her mother to shake her head.

 "That's OK," Dipper said. "Wendy and I will ride back here with Mom and Dad."

 "Pile in," Stan said. He checked his watch. "If we get out of here in the next six minutes, we save three bucks!"

 They all climbed in, Stan rolled down the privacy panel and asked, "Everyone's belts on? Good! Next stop, Gravity Falls! Wanda, have you ever been to Oregon before?"'

 "No, this is my first trip," Dipper's mom said, still looking a little dazed by the whole thing. "Is this your car?"

 "Just rented it for the occasion," Stan said as he made the turn for the exit. "We'd be a little crowded in the Stanleymobile. That's what I call my El Diablo."

 Dipper's dad practically bounced in his seat. " _You've got an El Diablo_? What year?"

 "Sixty-five convertible! First car I ever owned—and I still have it!"

 "It's in great shape, too," Wendy volunteered. "Like Stan!"

 "Hah! Thank you, Wendy! OK, let me pay the parking—here ya go, thanks—and now we're on the way. Ladies and gentlemen, sit back and relax and I'll describe some of the scenic wonders as we pass them. There's a tree. There's another one. That's a guy walking, I dunno, some kind of dog or marsupial or something. There's an office building . . .."

 They reached the Interstate, gradually went beyond the Portland environs, and as the highlands spread out ahead—it was a brilliantly clear day—they could see a little streaky snow showing on the mountains near the peaks. "The biggest one, with the most snow, that's Mount Hood. Others don't have so much yet. Snow won't really set in until December," Stanley told them. "No skiing this trip, but come back when it's really winter if you like to zoom down slopes and maybe hit some trees."

 Before long, both of Dipper's parents were looking out the windows—"Everything's still so green!" Mom said, though to Dipper, who was used to the summers, it looked more autumn-drab.

 And Wendy and Dipper very subtly sat so the back of her hand touched the back of his.

  _Dude, I got a whole bag of peppermints ready!_

 — _Can't wait! Wendy, I've been missing you so much!_

  _Same here, Dip. Did I text you about Devlin?_

 — _The guy you were pretending to date? No, what happened?_

  _He was feeling guilty 'cause we were fooling his parents, along with everybody else. So last week we broke up in public, but not in an argument, just at lunchtime in school. We're still friends, only we pretended to decide to go our separate ways, 'cause I got a part-time job and keep busy and so on and so forth. The gossip about you and me finally died down—we'll have to be careful not to start it up again on this trip!_

 — _No public displays of affection?_

  _Different when it's private, Dip! You'll see!_

 — _Wendy, what happened to Grunkle Stan? He looks so much fitter and his hair is even darker. What's going on?_

  _I'll let him tell you the whole story. Long story short, think Fountain of Youth._

 — _That's REAL?_

  _He and Ford say it is, and I can't argue with the results. How's everything going with you and Mabel?_

 — _Good. Mabel was sort of down for the first couple or three weeks of school—sad about Russ and all. But she and Teek have been Skyping like every day, and she's really up for seeing him again. How about you?_

  _Crazy busy, but doin' great in school. Guess it's time to tell you—I'm taking college classes!_

 — _What?_

  _No lie, man! Joint-enrollment with high school. I want to be on par with you when we start REAL college, so I'm drivin' over to the Community College two evenings a week and taking math and English. Guess what? I got an A average in both of them. Classes end two weeks from Thursday, and If I don't blow the final exams, I'll be an Honor Roll part-time student!_

 Dipper wanted so badly to kiss her. But he smiled at her and slyly squeezed her hand.

 — _Welcome to the world of dorks! One of us! One of us!_

 Wendy giggled a little at that. Mrs. Pines smiled. "What?"

 "Nothing, Mrs. Pines," the redhead said. "I was just noticing how much Dipper's starting to resemble his dad and great-uncle."

 "Oy!" Stan exclaimed from the driver's seat. " _There's_  bad news!"

 "I knew you'd say that!" Wendy called over her shoulder.

 "Yeah, but he's right, though," Mabel replied. "Fortunately, I have the beauty gene in the family!"

 "Are we staying in a hotel?" Mrs. Pines asked, as if ready to change the subject, or shut Mabel up, one or the other.

 "Nah!" Stan said. "You're staying with us. Our friend Dr. McGucket has a huge house—mansion, practically—and Stanford and I are sort of subleasing half of it. We've got a third-floor bedroom picked out for you with a terrific view of the town, river, and mountains. The kids will have adjoining rooms down one floor from you—they stay there with us lots of times."

 "Aw," Mabel said, "I wanted to stay in the Shack!"

 "The what?" Mrs. Pines asked, sounding apprehensive.

 "The Mystery Shack," Dipper said hastily. "It's a tourist attraction that Grunkle Stan created. We've told you—that's where we always stay in the summers, with our friends the Ramirez family."

 "People really enjoy it," Wendy said. "I work there in the summers as Assistant Manager. There's a Museum of Oddities—of course everyone knows they're not real, but they look great, they're funny, and people love them—and a gift shop and snack bar and all. You'll be my guests, and I'll personally give you the grand tour!"

 "Sounds like fun!" Dad said.

 His wife glanced at him. "Yes," she said, a little uncertainly, perhaps put off by the term _tourist attraction._ She was more of an art-museum type woman.

 On they drove for two hours, with Stan hyping the scenic wonders, Wendy and Dipper catching up in silent conversation, Mabel chattering about what great times they had in the summers, and Mom and Dad gradually falling under the patented Stanley charm.

 Finally, they turned off on a secondary highway, driving past a house that Dipper remembered from the time he, Wendy, and Mabel had been hurled into an alternate-dimension Comic Con. "A retired admiral lives there," he said.

 Dad looked. "He built a private military museum! Look, he's got a tank! I've always wondered what it's like to drive one!"

 Wendy beamed. "I know, right?"

 And then they were in the Valley, and a few minutes later, Stan pulled the limo around in the curved drive in front of the McGucket mansion. Fiddleford and Mayellen came out to greet them, and Ford hurried out behind them.

 Staring at his twin uncles, Alex said, "I can't get over how great you two are looking! Must be something in the air!"

 "Or maybe the water," Stan said mischievously.

 Mabel, Dipper, and Wendy hung back a little as Stan, Mr. Pines, and a servoid robomajig (Fiddleford names these things, I don't) gathered up the luggage. Mabel whispered, "How come our Grunkles look so not-old? What's up with that?"

 "They got up to something earlier this fall," Wendy said. "Maybe they'll tell you the whole story. Then you can tell me!"

 "Can we go over to the Shack now?" Mabel asked. She was shivering a little—the breeze was cold.

 "If you grab jackets and if your mom and dad say it's OK."

 "Aw, come on!" Mabel complained. "We're fifteen! You used to sneak off all the time when you were fifteen!"

 "Yeah," Wendy said. "You got a point. OK, my Dodge Dart's over there, and I guess it's not cold enough to insist you wear jackets. Let's make a break for it!"

 And ten seconds later, they peeled out for the Shack.


	5. Things to be Thankful For

**5\. Things to Be Thankful For**

 The Shack was closed for business. The sign that the kids and Soos had put up the previous summer had a big notice tacked to it: "HAPPY THANKSGIVING! CLOSED WEDNESDAY AND THURSDAY. COME SEE US THE DAY AFTER THE FEAST!"

 "Melody did that," Wendy explained as they turned into the long driveway. "Soos tried, but his notice kept getting too long for the sign. Stuff like  _Hey, dawgs, get together with your, like, family and biz, OK, and have the most greatest best Thanksgiving or call it like Turkey day if you want, dudes_ …and so on and so on!"

 "Sounds like Soos!" Dipper said. "Hey, who's here?"

 A pickup truck with an extended cab was parked in the lot, along with the Jeep, Soos's truck, Melody's car, and a couple of other familiar vehicles. Wendy laughed. "Cool! That's David Sawyer and his kids, Belinda and Rodney! You remember them!"

 "Oh, yeah!" Mabel said. "We rescued the kids from the Gnomes last Christmas when their dad was in jail up north. You and Grunkle Stan went up and bailed him out!"

 "Uh, yeah . . . _bailed,"_ Wendy said. In reality, it had been more of a jailbreak to spring Mr. Sawyer from the clutches of a corrupt and evil sheriff, but—the kids didn't need to know that yet.

 They found everyone in the parlor, and Rod and Belinda, now fourteen and twelve, respectively, came running to hug the twins. Mr. Sawyer, now looking healthy and dressed neatly, hugged Wendy and in a damp voice said, "Thank you so much for what you did."

 "My pleasure, dude," Wendy said. "Mabes here was the one who helped you get a job."

So, he hugged Mabel, too, who asked, "How's that working out for you, Mr. S?"

"Fine!" he said, taking out a handkerchief and blowing his nose. "Mr. Northwest keeps me busy, but the pay's good, we're on our feet, and the kids are loving school."

"Great!" Dipper said.

Soos had been hovering nearby, and suddenly he said, "Soos hug!"

Like most of his hugs, this one felt like being embraced by a slightly crazed but friendly bear. "Dudes, there's so much news! Mabel, dawg, your pigs are like awesome! They'll be glad to see you again! And Little Soos can walk like three steps before sitting down! And we're gonna have another one! Whoa, that's a surprise. Uh, we're gonna . . . have . . . another one . . . of those great Thanksgiving dinners! Yes, saved it!"

"It will be a good one," Abuelita said. "Oh, and Mabel, I am to tell you that Teek wants you to call him this afternoon when you have some times. He has a surprise he wants to show you."

"This is going to be a wonderful Thanksgiving," Melody said. "Dear, you can let them go now."

Soos finally broke his hug, which was fortunate because Dipper was starting to turn a little blue.

Upon her release, Mabel ran to hug Melody and Abuelita and to pick up and swing Little Soos around and around while he laughed like a hyena on nitrous oxide. Then she said, "Gonna check on Waddles and Widdles!" and ran out.

Melody, the Sawyer kids, and Soos breathlessly updated Dipper on everything that had happened in Gravity Falls since September 1. There had been sightings of a were-cow—"Wait, what?" Dipper asked. "A person who turns into a cow?"

"No," Soos said. "Even worse! It's like a cow that when the moon is full, it turns into a whole 'nother cow! By day it's a Holstein! By night it's a Jersey!"

"What . . . does it do, suck milk?" Dipper asked.

Soos wriggled his fingers, a gesture he'd picked up from Grunkle Stan in his Mr. Mystery mode. "That's the spookiest thing of all! Nobody knows! 'Cause it's like, dark at night and nobody pays any attention to what a cow does at night."

"Moot point, then," Dipper said.

"That's so true!" Soos said. "Ha! Moot, like in what a cow says! I'm gonna use that in my Mr. Mystery spiel! Thanks, Dipper!"

"You're welcome," Dipper said.

"Man," Soos said with a big grin. "This is the first Thanksgiving in years when everybody we love is around the table! Guess we got a lot of stuff to be thankful for this year."

"Hey, Dip," Wendy said nudging him, "wanna go for a little walk?"

"Kinda cold for it," Soos said. "The temperature hasn't gone up an inch since this morning—it's about forty, I think, and getting windy. I don't mean like redheaded Wendy, dawg. I mean like air currents moving across the landscape windy. What was I saying? Anyhow, want to borrow one of my jackets?"

Well—no, Dipper didn't, not unless he wanted to put up a couple of poles and tent under it. But Wendy had a spare jacket—it had belonged to her brother Junior years before, when he hadn't grown nearly as tall as Manly Dan and as big around as Soos, and though it was still big on Dipper, it didn't quite swallow him.

"How come you had this in the Shack?" Dipper asked as he shrugged into the fur-lined buckskin jacket.

Wendy shrugged. "Meh, one Saturday early in the month, it was freezing cold when I started out for the Shack, and I was too lazy to go all the way back to my room, 'cause I was already late leavin' for work. So, I grabbed this out of the front closet. Then it warmed up in the afternoon, and when I headed home, I just left it in my locker."

Their walk, inevitably, took them to the bonfire glade and just out of sight of the Shack. And they immediately hugged and kissed each other. "You're still gaining on me," Wendy said. "Five more inches, and we'll match!"

"I think my growth is getting slower, though," Dipper said. "And Mabel still has that millimeter on me."

They sat on the log—cold beneath their rumps—and hugged and nuzzled a little more. Wendy's uptilted nose was a bit pink and cold, and Dipper playfully kissed it. "I've really missed you, Dip," Wendy whispered.

"Missed you, too," Dipper said. "College girl! I'm so proud of you, too!"

"Yep," Wendy said, grinning. "The credits will transfer—I double-checked before getting myself into this—so I won't be as lost as I would've been going straight in from high school. And speaking of high school, I'm a Senior as of January!"

"What courses are you taking next?" Dipper asked.

"Same old same old in high school, you know. Oh, you mean at the Community College? OK, I've signed up for English 2 and American History 1. That sound good?"

"Sounds fine to me," Dipper told her. "Those are pretty common basic requirements, so you won't lose any credits when you transfer. How'd you do on the SATs?"

Wendy grimaced. "Well . . . not so hot the first time around, but I retook them. Up from a 1350 to a 1540 the second time, man!  _That's_  the one I'm gonna count!" 

"That's a good score," Dipper told her. "You could get into an Ivy League school with a score like that."

She kissed him again, and he discovered that she had put a peppermint candy in her mouth without his noticing. Then she said, "That was to thank you, dude! 'Cause almost the whole difference was in math! You shot me all that knowledge telepathically, remember, and when I looked at the test this time, it was like I'd just crammed successfully for it!"

"That will be a big help to both of us," Dipper said. "Hey, you've done the same thing for me!" He pointed. "That's a Douglas fir. Over there's a bitter cherry. California red fir."

Laughing, Wendy said, "You sound like that dumb old song Dad sometimes sings—raised in the woods and you know every tree! How about uploading what you know about American History? Let's do it while we kiss!"

The transfer was incredibly sudden, like an electric flash between them. But they kissed for a long time before Dipper murmured, "Can I ask you something?"

"Anything, Dip."

"What was the Monroe Doctrine?"

"Mm. That was sparked when Russia declared in 1821 that it owned the Pacific Northwest and no other nations could visit or trade there. In 1823, President James Monroe said that the U.S.A. would consider any future colonization attempt anywhere in the Western Hemisphere by European nations as an unfriendly act against our government. It wasn't named the Monroe Doctrine until 1850, though. How's that?"

"Great." He kissed her again. "And so is this," he whispered.

They didn't stay there too long—the wind was kicking up and it was really feeling colder—and Dipper, who had planned to go farther into the woods to the Bill Cipher effigy, changed his mind. Ford wanted him to see if he could contact Cipher in the Mindscape there—but Ford also wanted to be along as his wingman, and curiously, Dipper felt some apprehension about attempting it alone—and more especially about attempting it with Wendy nearby. Bill either teased Dipper a lot about Wendy or—just possibly—Bill had a weird kind of crush on the redhead, too.

When Wendy and Dipper got back to the Shack, Mabel was lecturing everyone. They walked in as she said, ". . . so don't mention any of the really weird things about Gravity Falls to my folks, OK? Just let them think this is a nice, quirky, friendly little town."

"It is that, certainly," Abuelita said, beaming.

"Don't worry, Mabel," Soos said. "We, like, promise to keep all the secrets secret! It's OK to talk about the Gnomes, though, right?"

"No!" Mabel said. "My folks would think that was weird!"

"Um, OK. But the Manotaurs?"

"No, Soos! Weird!" Mabel said.

"Yeah, I guess, maybe. The pterodactyls, though—"

"Weird!"

"The Lilliputt—"

"Weird! Dipper, get me a pad and a pen, OK?"

Mabel worked for a quarter of an hour with a somewhat chewed-up thinking pen and a ruled pad that Soos kept under the counter of the gift shop to keep track of inventory needs. She finally presented Soos with two columns, one marked OK TO TALK ABOUT and the second NO! TOO WEIRD!

The permissible subjects included Shack exhibits, Bottomless Pit (but don't say it's really bottomless), Mystery Trail, Outhouse of Mystery (but don't let anyone go inside it), and so on and so forth.

Banned subjects—well, the list was longer. Gnomes, the Gobblewonker (unless you say it's a legend), living wax statues, ghosts, SMILE DIP a BIG NO-NO, Manotaurs, Dipper clones, Quentin Trembley, peanut brittle as a preservative, time travel, video games coming to life, shrinking and growing rays, the Summerween Trickster (Summerween was OK), body-switching carpets, clone boy bands (SEV'RAL TIMEZ OK BUT DON'T SAY CLONES), living dinosaurs and pterodactyls, woodpecker-eating trees (Dipper said, "No, that's cool, they read Grunkle Ford's article" and Mabel crossed that one out), Bill Cipher and going into people's heads, giant killbots of any kind, zombies, Ford's lab and bunker, the Shapeshifter, Lilliputtians, mind-erasing guns, Society of the Blind Eye, love gods and love potions and love spells, lumberjack ghosts turning people into wood, Portals and alternate dimensions, evil venomous butterflies and alien monsters, UFOs, buried UFOs, games that trap you, Probabilator, mind-controlling ties, unicorns, spider people, ANY PART OF WEIRDMAGEDDON . . ..

Finally, Mabel wiped her forehead. "Whoosh! OK, Soos, memorize this list and don't talk about any that are too weird. Hmm…to help you, just remember 'If the subject would make Mom flip, then say nothing and zip your lip.'" She wrote that down.

"That," said Soos, "is totally radically awesome! OK, I got it!" He raised a finger and, looking solemn said, 'If the subject is just too weird, then Soos will, uh, something something eerd.' That'll help me remember, too!"

Mabel looked at Dipper. "Whattaya think, Brobro?"

"We're doomed," Dipper said cheerfully.


	6. A Bill Comes Due

**6\. A Bill Comes Due**

The twins had spent an hour and a half with their friends in the Mystery Shack, but when Wendy drove them back to Fiddleford's house and dropped them off, they discovered that their parents were still taking the grand tour. In fact, Fiddleford was a bit puzzled when he discovered there were still two whole floors that he'd never even seen himself. "It's a little bit like living in the Modern Museum of Too Much," he told the others.

 They had lunch in the grand dining room, which held a table big enough for thirty people, and more of Fiddleford's robomastaff prepared and served the meal, impressing Mr. Pines and mildly frightening Mrs. Pines. "In a few years," Ford predicted cheerfully, "these wonderful mechanical devices will make life easier for every housewife!"

 Wanda gave him a strained smile as she edged away from a scuttling teapot on wheels that poured steaming tea into her cup, right at the brink of the table. But it didn't spill a drop.

 That afternoon, Stan took Mr. and Mrs. Pines on a long drive around Roadkill County, again pointing out places of interest and showing them scenic wonders, occasionally slipping into Mr. Mystery patter almost unconsciously: "The old railroad bridge up there once led to an extensive mining complex, but it played out years ago, and now only the ghosts of the miners hang around there. Well, that's what they say, you know how these country folks love to make up yarns! Hah, ghosts! You might just as well expect to see, I dunno, dinosaurs down there!"

 Back at the McGucket house, Ford asked, "Mason, are you ready to confront Bill in the Mindscape?"

 "As I'll ever be, I guess," Dipper said. They both dressed warmly—a cold front was coming in, and the dropping temperature now hovered just above freezing—and Ford drove Dipper over to the Shack one more time. They briefly popped in to tell Soos what they were up to, and then they hiked back along the Mystery Trail, past the Bottomless Pit and the bonfire glade, and down along the straggly track in the woods to the spot where the fossilized Bill Cipher had plunged to earth as Weirdmageddon had ended.

 "Never been here in the fall," Dipper said as they swished through crackling dry leaves. Overhead, a rising wind made the treetops sway and rustle and swept more dead leaves swirling down. They emerged in the small clearing where a massive timber that had fallen from the disintegrating Fearamid lay half-buried in leaves. Just across from it, and facing it, was the Bill Cipher effigy.

 "Grunkle Ford," Dipper said quietly, "you sit here and watch. I'm going up close. If I look like I'm in trouble—"

 "I'll come and get you," Ford promised, putting his big hand on Dipper's shoulder. "You're a brave young man, Mason. Braver than I was at your age. Good luck!"

 Hunched in his jacket, Dipper walked forward. He felt butterflies in his stomach—something new. A couple of years before, Cipher had come to his rescue when an interdimensional monster called the Horroracle had left him dying—of course, Bill had done that out of his own self-interest, because time in Earth's dimension had frozen, and only Dipper's coming back to life could start it moving again. Not wanting to be trapped in timelessness like a fly in amber, Bill had exchanged a few molecules with Dipper in order to get the boy's heart started again.

 And the little bit of Bill in Dipper and the tiny amount of Dipper in Bill had changed them both. Dipper had conversed with Bill in the Mindscape many times since then, and though the nacho-chip demon loved to taunt and tease him, they had become—what? Not friends, exactly. Frenemies, maybe.

 Now Dipper kicked together a pile of dry leaves and sat on them, cross-legged, just in front of the effigy. A crisp brown oak leaf had plastered itself over the slitted eye. Dipper leaned forward and plucked it off before closing his own eyes, slowing his breathing, and concentrating on entering a kind of trance state.

 It was harder than usual—his apprehension was doing that. But Dipper forced himself to breathe deeply and slowly, and before too long he felt the pleasant kind of numbness that told him he was drifting into the Mindscape.

* * *

"Bill? Are you there?"

Nothing for a short space. Dipper had an aching sense of loneliness. He almost backed himself out of the trance—

 "Pine Tree! Nice of you to visit."

"Where are you?" Dipper asked. "I can't see you."

"Oh, everywhere and nowhere. OK, look straight ahead. Concentrate."

Dipper's trance self stared forward. He could see the statue—or the Mindscape equivalent of it, a little distorted—but not Bill himself.

And then somebody thumped him hard on the back of the head. "Gotcha, sucker! Ah-hah-hah-hah!"

A moment later, Bill himself swirled around and hovered in front of Dipper. "You've grown," Dipper said. "But your tie's still in my colors."

The glowing yellow triangle shrugged, as much as an equilateral shape could, and straightened the natty white-blue-and-pink bow tie. "Yeah, what ya gonna do, kid? I'm used to it now. Still wear the hat, though! The BLACK HAT!" His voice boomed in a kind of nasty parody of his threatening tones the time he'd planned to kill one of the twins: "Eeeny, Meeny, Minie, YOU!"

"Bill—what are you up to? You told me you were going to leave our dimension."

 Drooping, Cipher settled to the ground, sitting among the leaves and leaning back against his own effigy—he was only about a twentieth its size. "The best-laid plans of mice and men and me gang agley, Pine Tree! OK, I'll clarify. No, I'll obfuscate. No, a little of both! So . . . when Fordsy over there wiped Stanley's brain—and  _that_ didn't take much effort, believe me you—I felt myself burning away. So I appealed to—ugh!—the Axolotl. Told you about it, didn't I? You want to know a little about that infini-dimensional busybody, read up on the Aztec god Xolotl."

 "Another demon?" Dipper asked.

 "Not prezactly, kid. It's a little bit what the Aztecs _thought_ their deity Axolotl was like, but their concept's just kind of a dim reflection of mega-reality. OK, the case is sort of like this—when the Creator dreamed up the Multiverse, there had to be somebeing to make sure the realities didn't slop together too overmuch. That's the old Axolotl. Everywhere, everywhen, all the time, 24/7, simultaneously. Now, I admit I got on the bad sides of Axolotl—it has about fifty million of them—because of my humble ambition to RULE THIS UNIVERSE! MWAH-HAH-HAH!" When Dipper didn't respond, Bill said, "Well, _I_  thought it was funny."

"What happened?" Dipper asked. "Look, did you somehow intervene in Ford's and Stan's life a while back?"

 " _Intervene_  is such a harsh word, Pine Tree! Let's say I _meddled_. Just a little. OK, here's the deal: My old dimension was is will be decaying, right? But the Axolotl can regenerate it and me with it. Then I can go back and make amends for all the crimes against existence I committed.  _That_ will take a couple trillion years! But first I got to learn—yech— _virtues._  I have to be—" Bill held up his left hand and counted on his fingers with his right, growing new digits as needed: "Humble, generous, charitable, patient, diligent, kind, loving—I'm nauseating myself! You get the gist."

"So you're trying to . . . redeem yourself so you can, what? Go back to your own dimension and rule it?"

"No. Not rule. Live in it," Bill said in a small voice. "And try to help others instead of hurting them. It goes against my nature, kid. But I  _am_  trying. Trouble is, Axolotl forgot to give me the manual. How'm I supposed to know if I'm helping humans or hurting them? I don't understand you meatbags—I mean that in the nicest possible way. My trial run was helping Fordsy and Stansy to fulfill their stupid quest for the stupid Fountain of Youth. I didn't know whether getting the water would be better for them, or if maybe _not_  getting it was what they needed! Anyways, I split the diff and got them each just a sip. Know the real kicker? The Axolotl doesn't give out report cards! I still don't know if I did good or bad! How do you tell, kid?"

"I—well, that's hard," Dipper said. "It's a matter of your conscience."

"Yeah, I got one of them now. Came with your molecules. Little cricket guy." Bill burst into laughter. "Look at your face! I kid, I kid! Not a cricket, just a little voice in my head. I  _think_  I did the right thing, but—who knows?"

 "Well," Dipper said slowly, "good things are coming from what you did for them. Ford and Stanley got back some of the time they lost because you were trying to control Ford and indirectly because of you, Stan accidentally sent him through the Portal. Their having a second chance to be happy is a good thing, I think."

 "I hope so," Bill said. He perked up, "Hey, I know! I'll do you and Shooting Star favors! That's gotta look good in the old account book!" He squinted his eye and tapped on his nonexistent chin as he thought. "Hmmm . . . I can still get my hands on some Fountain of Youth water! Tell you what, I'll get a few drops and slip 'em into Wendy's coffee! Make her fifteen again!" Bill rubbed his hands together. "You'd both be the same age! And you know what they say about fifteen-year-old human girls!"

 "No!" Dipper said. "Don't do—wait, what  _do_  they say?"

Bill waggled an eyebrow he didn't have. " _Hubba-hubba_! No, wait, they haven't said that for eighty years. Sorry, I got nothing. Don't do it? You serious, Pine Tree?"

 "Leave Wendy alone," Dipper said firmly. "Back in Mabel's bubble, I got tempted to change my own age—but I knew that would be wrong. Making Wendy younger would be just as bad."

"Will of titanium," Bill muttered. "Un-freaking-believable."

"Look," Dipper said, "I can't keep this up much longer. Truth is a virtue, too, Bill. Tell me honestly, can you take physical form?"

"Kinda-sorta," Bill said, waggling a stick-figure hand. "I can assume the appearance of a human-type person, but I can't hold it together for more than a few minutes at a time. And when I project into the physical realm, my body's got the consistency of living plastic foam. Weighs hardly anything, and I have nearly no muscle tone."

"Then the boy that Ford told me about was really you?"

"Um . . . for a certain definition of  _me_ , yes." Bill's cane appeared in his hand, and he gestured with it, as if doing an imitation of Stan as Mr. Mystery: "Ah, yes, I conglomerated a confabulation of airy elements compounded with minute particles of dust to create a convincing apparition of a ten-year-old boy! I could walk and talk and crawl on my belly like a reptile, though let me tell you, kid, there's not much fun in that! But I was real enough to give Fordsy some pointers and to talk to old Ponce de Leon. And of course I got a trip to Florida out of the deal! But that was a bummer."

"Why?"

"Because I didn't get to visit the Happiest Place on Earth and take my favorite ride!" Bill started to hum the "Small World" theme and then laughed insanely. "Man, that earworm is  _diabolical_! I should have thought of that when I was still a pure chaotic evil being! In fact, I kind of believe I did!"

"If that's true, you have a lot to answer for," Dipper said. "So, what happened to you after you appeared to my Grunkles?"

"Not much. I had those very few minutes in the physical realm. Then for a while I was nothing. A conscious nothing, but a nothing, until I reformed here in the Mindscape a few thousand years ago, or was it a few weeks? I get them confused." He flickered and began to fade.

Dipper said, "Bill, I'm starting to lose you. Can we visit again?"

The voice became distant and faint, like a far echo: "Any time, Pine Tree. Just meet me in the Mindscape, or maybe I'll manifest and see you around! Hey, if I make mistakes, forgive me. My intentions are purely selfish, but on the side of goodness."

* * *

"That's a contra—" Dipper started to say, but suddenly he was fully awake. He felt Ford's hand on his shoulder.

"Are you all right?" Ford asked.

"—diction. Uh. I think so." Dipper pushed up from the ground and brushed dried leaves from his jeans. "How long was I out?"

Ford helped him to his feet. "Maybe a minute. I take it you did get in touch with Bill. You were mumbling, but I couldn't understand what you said."

"I talked to him," Dipper said. He frowned. "He's sort of still trapped in the Mindscape, but somehow he's got limited powers of manifesting as a physical presence. The boy you saw in Florida was either him or a kind of projection of him." Dipper told his great-uncle what Bill had said.

"A Bill trying to be good, but still a chaotic being. That's almost as disturbing as having him lusting to exterminate us," Ford said. "I shudder to think of what Bill Cipher could do to us while trying to be helpful! Well, at least he won't be trying to kill us outright or turn us into pieces of his Throne of Agony. I hope. The Axolotl, you say?"

"Or the Aztec god Xolotl." Dipper frowned. "I don't think I pronounced that right. Not zo-lot-till, but . . ." he struggled. "Shzo-low-tl. That's still not right, but closer."

"I've never studied the Aztec pantheon," Ford admitted, "but I shall do so. Are _you_ all right? Mentally and physically?"

"Fine," Dipper said. "Bill offered to 'help' Wendy, but I told him not to do it. We're getting along without his help."

"Best you do," Ford said. "Let's walk back."

On the way, Ford said, "Oh, before I forget, I haven't told you my news about your book. The agent I sent it to in New York is a nice woman named Beatrice Bergon. She likes it and will try to find a publisher for you."

The numb feeling that always lingered after a conference with Bill in the Mindscape evaporated. "That's great!"

"She cautioned, though," Ford said, "that it's a tough market. But I told her to go ahead and see what she can do. Should I put her directly in touch with you? All she knows is that you're my nephew and a young man."

"Do I have to tell her I'm fifteen?" Dipper asked.

"No," Ford said with a smile. "Not unless she asks, and she probably won't. I'll give you her electronic mail address and her telephone number. She may want you to sign an agreement. By the way, her commission is fifteen per cent on any sale—I hope that's agreeable?"

"Sure," Dipper said. "Uh—did she say anything about what she thinks of the book?"

"She said you may need to edit it and rewrite a little, but overall it impressed her. Your story and characters made her laugh and the plot was pleasantly scary in parts and she thinks with the right publisher, kids would love it," Ford said. "Bravo, Dipper! Bravo!"

Dipper was grinning like an idiot.  _I can't wait to tell Wendy!_ he thought. But then he had another, disturbing thought:  _Wait, what if this is Bill—HELPING me?_

 


	7. Family News

******7\. Family News**

* * *

 

That Wednesday night was, in a way, a pre-Thanksgiving Thanksgiving. Everyone gathered at Fiddleford's house—the McGuckets, of course, Stanley and Ford, with their ladies Sheila and Lorena, the Pines family from Piedmont, plus Wendy and Teek, then the Ramirez family (Little Soos on a booster seat), and with some exertion even Abuelita was persuaded just to sit and enjoy the dinner instead of bustling around serving everyone.

 Their meal was delicious but fairly simple—salad and a modest entrée with vegetables and bread. "There's no sense in spoiling tomorrow for everyone," Mayellen said kindly—and throughout, laughter and smiles punctuated it.

 Mr. and Mrs. Pines sat between Ford and Stan, and across the table from Mom sat Dipper, across from Dad Mabel, and beside Dipper Wendy and beside Mabel Teek, so even in the ridiculously oversized dining room it was pretty cozy.

As they finished dessert (a big sweet cherry cobbler with vanilla ice cream, one of Mayellen's specialties), everyone seemed happy and satisfied. Then Teek said, "Um, everybody—I have some news that I think Mabel would like!"

 Mrs. Pines looked a tiny bit worried, but Teek turned to Mabel and said, "I have a car!"

 Mabel hugged him. "Yes! I knew you could do it!"

 "Well," Teek confessed when she let go of him, "it really is in Dad's name. But I get to drive it!"

 Mr. Pines immediately leaned over the table and asked, "What did you get, Teek?"

 "It's a four-year-old Fusion," Teek said. "My folks liked the safety features, and it gets pretty good mileage."

 "What color?" Mabel asked

 "Good choice, the Fusion," Dad said, nodding. He looked across the table. "Dipper, remember that!"

 "Uh, it's silver," Teek told Mabel.

 Then Ford stood up. "Well, Stanley and I have some news, too. And it may affect your holiday plans, so—Stanley?"

 Grinning, Stan got up beside him, and helped Sheila to her feet, while Ford pulled back Lorena's chair for her. Then the men held the women's hands, and Ford went on: "They say it's never too late to fall in love."

 "Yeah," Stan said. "And I sure hope they're right!"

 Chuckling a little weakly, Ford said, "Well, that being the case, I've asked this lovely lady to marry me, and Stanley has proposed to Sheila—"

 "Who's also lovely," Stan insisted. "And too good for me!"

 Forging ahead, Ford said, "And they've said yes."

 Both Sheila and Lorena held up their left hands to show off their sparkling engagement rings. They were smiling broadly, and Stan kissed Sheila—and then Lorena kissed Ford, who was a little shyer than his outgoing brother.

Everyone stood up, offering congratulations and cheers. Soos said, "Yes! Now Mr. Pines, you can have a little Mr. Mystery Junior of your own!"

"Not too late for love," Stan said. "But maybe a little late for  _that!_ "

 When the clamor died down, Ford held up both six-fingered hands. "Our fiancées and we want to have a double wedding," he said. "And we'd love for everyone to be there. So—Alex, Wanda—will you and the twins join us the day after Christmas here, in Gravity Falls?"

 "Sure we will!" Dad said, shaking Ford's hand and then reaching across Mrs. Pines to shake Stan's, too. "We'll come up for the wedding, and then the twins can stay for the rest of their break!"

 "Great!" Stan said. "It's not gonna be a great big affair. We were thinking of just the immediate family and a few friends, and we'll have it somewheres—"

 "Right here in th' house!" Fiddleford insisted. "We got scadoodles of big rooms! The ballroom will be perfect!"

 "Thank you, Fiddleford," Ford said. "That would be lovely, but we sort of have or hearts set on the Shack. We're going to have a sort of nondenominational ceremony. I'm not sure who'll officiate, but we'll plan for two o'clock, Saturday, December 27. And you'll get invitations, but of course everyone here is invited—your family, too, Wendy, and yours, T.K."

 "I call bridesmaid!" Mabel shouted.

 "You can't have it!" Stan snapped, making her look as if she were about to burst into tears. Then her Grunkle grinned. "'Cause you get to be Maid of Honor for both our brides! Wendy, Sheila and Lorena want to ask if you'd be a bridesmaid."

 "Yes! Score!" Mabel yelled, doing an air-punch. "Say yes, Wendy!"

 "Sure," Wendy said with her lazy smile. "Only I'll look kinda gawky and out of place in a dress!"

 "No, you won't!" Sheila assured her. "We're not going to insist on color coordination or any of that. We want people to be comfortable. You and I and Lorena will go shopping and we'll find you a dress you really like!"

 "Ordinarily," Ford said, "I'd ask Stan to be my best man and he'd ask me to be his—"

 "Don't count on it, Poindexter," Stan said. "I'm very close to my bookie!"

 Everyone laughed.

 Ford continued, "But under the circumstances, I'd like to ask Fiddleford to be my best man. Stanley?"

 Stan looked oddly shy. "Well, Alex, you and your wife gave me the honor of letting me look after Dipper and Mabel. That's the biggest gift anybody ever gave me. So will you stand up with me as my best man?"

 "My pleasure!" Dad said.

 Ford smiled at Dipper. “And we both of you want to be our groomsman and keeper of the rings.”

 “Uh—sure,” Dipper said. “I guess.”

 “You can do it, Brobro!” Mabel cheered.

 And Soos and Teek would be ushers, and before long it was all arranged.

 

* * *

That evening after dinner, Teek, Mabel, Wendy, and Dipper went—bowling, at the Bowl-Sum-More Lanes.

Not really. That's what they _said,_ but then instead they drove past the bowling alley and sat parked in Wendy's car at Lookout Point, overlooking the valley. It was a cold evening. The car was so chilly they had to snuggle.

No one minded.

 "Maid of Honor!" Mabel said from the back seat. "At fifteen! I gotta call the Guinness Book of World Records to see if I qualify as the youngest ever!"

 "Pretty sure you don't," Wendy told her from the front seat. Dipper, with his arms around her, thought that one great thing about the Dodge Dart was that the front had a bench seat, not bucket seats. It made this kind of parking a lot warmer and cozier.

 "What does an usher do?" Teek asked.

 "You ush!" Mabel told him.

 "Just guide folks to their seats," Wendy said. "If it's a lady, you offer her your arm. Usually the groom's family and friends are on one side, the bride's on the other, but my guess is that this is gonna be just a sit-anywhere deal. You just gotta sort of balance out the two sides of the seating, that's all. Hey, if Soos can pull it off, so can you!"

 "Doesn't sound too hard," Teek decided.

 "When can I go for a ride in your car?" Mabel asked him.

 "Uh—not until May," Teek said. "Because under Oregon law, I can't have a passenger under the age of 20 until I've had my license for six months."

 "Yeah," Wendy said. "Like, at first I wasn't supposed to drive with you two in the car at all! But by the time I drove you up for Christmas break, it was OK, 'cause I'd had my license long enough."

 "You guys are lucky," Mabel grumbled. "Stupid California law says we can't get a real driver's license until we're 18! Dip and me start taking Driver's Ed in January, but we can't even get our provisional permits until we're sixteen!"

 "I can wait," Dipper said.

 "I can't!" Mabel responded. "Vrrrrooom! Vrrrroooom! I'm gonna be the terror of the highway! Grand Theft Auto, Mabel style, baby!"

 "Which," said Dipper, "is exactly why _I_  can wait!"

 

* * *

Later, Wendy dropped Teek off at his house, then took Mabel and Dipper back to the McGuckets'. "Wish you could come and have Thanksgiving with us," Dipper told her as they stood holding hands outside the front door.

 "Yeah, me, too," Wendy said with a sigh. "But—I gotta cook for Dad and the boys and my aunts and uncles and cousins! So I'll be up at like four in the morning. And believe me, you wouldn't want to be a guest at a Corduroy Thanksgiving! Not unless you're big into arm-wrestling and belching and farting contests."

 "Ew!" Dipper said.

 "I know, right? But I'll be over bright and early on Friday, and we'll go hang out all day."

 "Can't wait," Dipper said.

 She kissed him.  _Love you, man!_

 — _Love you too, Lumberjack Girl!_  

* * *

Mabel was waiting in his room. Dipper flopped back on the bed, and she flopped beside him. "So, whtcha think? We're getting Graunties! Yay!"

"It's gonna seem strange," Dipper said. "But I like Sheila and Lorena, and they seem to love our Grunkles, so I guess it's for the best."

"So—is that guff about the Fountain of Youth true?"

Dipper shrugged, as much as he could while lying back. "Guess so. _Something_ sure made Stan and Ford look a whole lot younger!"

"I kinda miss Stan's big gut," Mabel admitted. "Huh. You know, Wendy once said that she wished she could be twelve again. I wonder—"

"No!" Dipper said. "Uh-uh, no way. Forget it. She's perfect just the way she is."

"You're no fun, Pine Tree!"

Dipper yelled and rolled off the bed. He hit the floor and then bounced back up. "Bill! What the hell, man?"

The fake Mabel, crouching on the edge of the bed, stared at him with yellow eyes that had slits for pupils. "Just making sure. Uggh! Can't hold this form! Hey, kid, hit Fez Head up for a gold nugget and bring it to me, OK? Remember, kid—the universe is a hologram!"

With a silent poof, Mabel's form popped out of existence. A second later, someone tapped on Dipper's bedroom door. He opened it.

Mabel said, "I just wanted to—whoa! What are you doing?"

"Look me in the eye!" Dipper demanded.

Normal Mabel eyes.

"Whoo," he said, letting her in. "I just had a visitor. Bill Cipher, disguised as you."

She gave him a bug-eyed look of horror. "No!"

"Yeah. He's sort of able to pop into existence now, but not for long. And he can disguise himself to look like pretty much anybody—or anything, I guess. So be careful!"

"Is he after us again?" Mabel asked, hopping up to sit on his bed.

Dipper's heart was just beginning to slow down. "No, I don't think so. He's got this weird kind of repentance thing or some deal going on." He told her as much as he knew.

"Oh, my gosh," Mabel said. "He could show up as Waddles! Or Teek! I'd better make sure I look into Teek's eyes! Maybe kiss him just to be sure!" Lowering her voice, she confided, "See, I have to make sure it's Teek, 'cause I think Bill's always had a thing for me!"

"Be careful," Dipper said. "He thinks he's trying to help us, but his idea of help can be a little—well—"

"Crazy bonkers?" Mabel asked, using one of Soos's expressions.

"Yeah, that." Dipper scrunched up his face in worry.  _What if he appeared to me disguised as Wendy?_ He shivered, recalling how the Shapeshifter had done that, and how terrified he had been—and how in Mabel's prison bubble, a seductive Wendy had turned out to be a bunch of horrible bugs in her shape!

"We just have to be real careful, then," Mabel said. "Can we somehow send him away again, into the Mindscape or whatever?"

"He's there most of the time anyway," Dipper said. "I'm not sure how it works, but he has to be, like, judged, I guess? By somebody called the Axolotl."

"Gesundheit!" Mabel said.

"That wasn't a sneeze. It's the name of some—I don't know, force, power, being—that for some reason Bill has to answer to now. He's supposed to be helping people."

"But Bill's help . . ." Mabel said, and then trailed off.

"Is worse than having some other creatures trying to kill us!" Dipper finished.

For a moment the twins just stared at each other. Then Mabel said, "That makes me so hot! Wanna make out, Pine Tree?"

"Yahhh!" Dipper yelped, jumping off the bed again.

Mabel rolled around on the bed and laughed her head off. "Gotcha, Brobro!"

Dipper was so furious that he hit her with a pillow.

Which began an epic pillow fight that, in the huge McGucket house, no one heard or came to break up. For a few minutes they felt like they were twelve again.

And really, that felt pretty good.


	8. Pre-Turkey

**8\. Pre-Turkey**

* * *

 

At 5:45 on Thursday morning someone shook Dipper's shoulder. He woke up with a gasp. "What! What?"

"Shhh!" A hand touched his cheek.  _Just me, man! I snuck off to see if you wanted to run this morning before I have to turn into the Corduroy galley slave._

— _Wendy! I was dreaming of Weirdmageddon, I think. Uh, sure! How cold is it out?_

' _Bout twenty-eight degrees. You have some sweatpants and a sweatshirt?_

— _Yeah. Give me five minutes._

And that was about how long it took for Dipper to get into thick gray sweatpants, a heavy hooded sweatshirt with a big purple-and-white PHA (Piedmont High Athletics) logo on the chest, and his black trainers. He met Wendy in the hall and they quietly went out by the front door.

Curiously, Fiddleford and Mayellen never locked their doors. Of course, that could be because they had a potentially murderous robot butler that Fiddleford had made from an ornate Queen Anne chair who was polite to anyone it recognized but menacing to any strangers. It saw them out impassively, then settled down, crossed its arms, and appeared to watch the entrance intently but without any eyes.

The sun was just coming up. "A quickie this morning, OK? We'll just run around town and back," Wendy said. She looked odd, bundled up in her own dark-green sweat outfit, but beautifully odd, Dipper thought. Before they'd reached the end of the drive, he'd pulled the string on his hood—his ears were tingling in the frosty air. “We’ll take it easy, too, ‘cause you’re not used to the cold.”

True enough, the long easy stride they broke into soon warmed him, and he felt all right by the time they came to the downtown area. Nothing much stirred there on a holiday morning, but Dipper saw that Greasy's Diner was just opening, with a waist-tall black-on-yellow folding A-frame sign out front that read OPEN THANKSGIVING FOR BREAKFAST ONLY, and two or three cars were already parked there for an eye-opening meal.

They detoured a little to run past the abandoned Dusk2Dawn convenience store—Wendy waved at the blank windows and yelled, "Happy Thanksgiving, ghost dudes!"—and from there to Circle Park and then over to the water tower, around it, and back toward the McGuckets' house, about a one-mile jog or a little more.

"Not too shabby, man," Wendy said with a grin as they pounded back up the driveway. "'Specially since you're not exactly used to running in freezing weather! You doing OK?"

"Fine," Dipper said, his breath puffing out in a cloud of vapor. "Have some breakfast?"

"Mm, better not, man. Gotta get the stove fired up and the turkey on to cook. One of my aunts is bringing a ham and another one's bringing another turkey, but mine's gotta be the centerpiece. The one Dad got weighs close to thirty pounds, so it's gonna take a lot of cooking! But I'll have a quick cup of coffee with you."

Though it was nearly seven, no one was stirring yet. They went to the smaller "family" kitchen, where Wendy put on a pot of coffee and Dipper found himself a bowl, some milk, and some cereal. He also popped down a couple of slices of toast and found a container of cream.

By then the coffee was ready. Wendy poured two cups and tipped a tiny bit of cream in hers. He poured some in his own cup, and she smiled. "Not taking it as light as you used to!"

"I'm down to about a tablespoonful of cream," Dipper said. "Just enough to take the edge off."

Stan came wandering in, looking unkempt. "Coffee smells great!" he said. "Enough for me to have a cup?"

"Help yourself, dude," Wendy said. "You know, Mr. Pines, you could at least put on some pants in the morning."

"Time enough for that before the big feast," Stan said. He was wearing his ratty old pale-green bathrobe and the same blue bedroom slippers that Mabel had once unsuccessfully tried to transport milk in. He grabbed a mug and poured a big slug of coffee in it and took a long swig. "Hey, this stuff actually tastes good! You make it, Dipper?"

"No, me," Wendy said, finishing her cup. "Well, I gotta run. See you tomorrow, Dip! Have a good Turkey Day, you guys! And congrats to you and Sheila, Mr. Pines!"

"I ain't your boss no more," Stan said. "So, make it Stan from now on!"

"Got it, Stan! Later, Pines dorks!"

When she left, Stan poured the last of the coffee into his mug and asked Dipper, "What did she mean by that?"

"That she likes us," Dipper said, smiling. "Uh—you want toast or cereal or—"

"Now that you mention it," Stan said, settling in at the table, "Fry me up a couple eggs, see if there's not some link sausage in the middle drawer of the big fridge—two links—and yeah, some of that rye bread toasted with butter and jam would be real good. And put on another pot of coffee."

"Yes, sir," Dipper said with mock-military compliance. He started a new pot of coffee, washed his and Wendy's cups and his cereal bowl and spoon, and then got busy at the stove.

Stan watched him. "You picked up some skills from Wendy," he said.

"Yeah, I learned some simple cooking," Dipper told him. "Still like your eggs over medium?"

"Right. And that's turkey sausage?"

"Says it is." When the sausage was beginning to sizzle and the eggs to cook, Dipper found the rye bread and popped two slices into the twelve-slice toaster.

In about ten minutes he set the plate with eggs, sausage, and buttered toast in front of Stan and then put down a pot of orange marmalade. "Here you go. Hope it's good."

Stan freshened up his coffee and tasted it. "Meh, your java's a little bit weaker than Wendy's, but I can't complain. It's better than th' slop Ford brews up!" He tried the eggs and sausage and nodded. "Not bad, kid!"

"Anybody can cook breakfast," Dipper said. "Wendy's the wizard in the kitchen. Well, her and Teek—Teek makes the most fantastic burgers."

"Yeah, he does!" Stan agreed. "That moron Soos was a genius to hire him. What? You're smiling at me funny."

"Just thinking of you and Sheila getting married," Dipper said. "I hope you guys will be very happy."

"Thanks, Dip," Stan said. "Man to man, I know I'll be happy. I just hope I can be the kinda guy that Sheila deserves."

"You will be," Dipper said.

"Kid, that means a lot to me," Stan told him. "Now. I'd like to ask a favor from you."

"Anything."

"Wash and dry the dishes and pans!"

Dipper couldn't help laughing. "OK, but it'll cost you!"

"How much?" Stan asked with a fake groan.

"One gold nugget!"

To Dipper's surprise, Stan said, "Deal. Remind me to give it to you later, when I got my pants on. I never carry gold in my bathrobe!"

* * *

Up in their bedroom, the twins' mother said, "Are you awake, dear?"

Alex Pines grunted and snored.

"Alex, dear? Are you awake?" She shook him. "Are you awake?"

"I guess I am," he said, rolling over onto his back. "What?"

"I'm worried."

"Mm-hmm. What is it this time?"

"Well—both of your uncles are getting married."

"They're grown men," Alex said, yawning. "They've got a right to. And they're marrying very good matches—Sheila's got a great sense of humor that'll help her deal with Uncle Stan, and Lorena's a walking encyclopedia. She and Uncle Stanford can have long, meaningful lecture nights with each other. They'll be happy, don't worry!"

"But—I mean, both of them making Dipper best man and  Mabel the Maid of Honor—"

"Don't they call it 'Maiden of Honor' when she's still in her teens?" her husband asked.

"Yes, I believe that's right—oh, dear, I'll have to remember to make a note to proofread the invitations and programs. But what I was getting at—do you think Mabel can be trusted with such a responsibility?"

Alex put on his glasses and looked as his wife, who didn't appear to be kidding. "Sure I do, hon. Mabel's a great kid! And she loves both of her Grunkles."

"There's no such word in the English language," Wanda complained.

"There is in the language of family love, though," Alex said. "Come on, it's an endearment. She loves them, and she wouldn't hurt them for the world, so she'll do an outstanding job. You'll be proud of her."

"I wish I'd known that Wendy was younger than I thought," Wanda fretted. "I thought she was at least twenty when we met her!"

"She's seventeen now," her husband said. "But I'd say she's very mature for her age. Very responsible. I don't know many high-school girls who could hold down a job and rise to be assistant manager and go to school full-time  _and_ restore a classic car! That takes a lot of brains, talent, and maturity."

"Why do you think she takes such an interest in Mabel?" Wanda asked. "It isn't something we should worry about, is it?"

That surprised a little yip of laughter from Alex. "You mean you think Wendy has a crush on our daughter? You want me to tell you the real secret?"

"What?"

"I got this straight from Mabel. To Mabel, Wendy's a big sister. To Wendy, Mabel's the little sister she always wanted. Except for Wendy, there are only boys in her family—and her mother died when Wendy was about five or six. Sisters, darling, that's all." He chuckled. "You'd do better to worry about Wendy having a crush on Mason!"

His wife giggled. "Don't be silly. She's _far_ too mature for him!"

"I wish they  _would_  fall in love," Alex said wistfully. "To have a daughter-in-law who knows her way around an internal-combustion engine! That would be really something."

"Do you think—would it be all right, do you suppose, if I said a word to Wendy about her keeping Mabel in line during the wedding? I'm so afraid Mabel will embarrass herself."

"No," Alex said, "you are not. You're worried that she'll embarrass you! Sweetheart, Mabel is Mabel! She's a free spirit. I'd never want to clip her wings, and I won't ask Wendy to do it. But I'll have a chat with her about wedding decorum, all right?"

"All right." She sighed. "If we'd known that Stanford was really Stanley, I mean two years ago, and that his museum was really a tourist trap, I'd never have let our son and daughter come up here to stay with him."

"Just as well you didn't know it, then," Alex said. "They've bonded here, they love the town, and it makes them better people. Dipper's come out of his shell, Mabel has directed her energies to be more creative and less destructive, and everyone here obviously loves them. Best thing we ever did, sending the twins up here!"

"I suppose," Mrs. Pines murmured. Then she smiled. “You’re absolutely right. I’m just too fussy, I guess. Gravity Falls has been good to our whole family.”

Her husband switched on the bedside lamp and ruffled his hair, scratching his scalp. "What time is it?"

"A few minutes after seven."

Alex groaned. "We're away on holiday, you don't have to cook a Thanksgiving dinner, our hosts told us to sleep in as long as we want, and it's a few minutes after seven! Oy!"

"Well, I couldn't sleep! I was worried!"

"You do enough of that for the whole family," Alex told her. He kissed her cheek. "It will all turn out fine," he said. "You'll see."

"I hope so," Wanda replied.

* * *

The Willets, a thin, spry elderly couple, arrived at eight sharp to begin cooking. For a long time, they had owned their own popular restaurant outside the Valley, but they'd decided to retire, sold out for a very nice profit, and then after a few months became bored and took up catering.

He was a first-class chef; she was a pastry cook and saucier ("A sorcerer of a saucier!" her husband always joked proudly). The big family kitchen impressed them ("Better than the one in our restaurant!") and they happily got to work.

By then everyone in the house was up and breakfasted, except Mabel, who liked to spend any vacation from high school catching up on her sleep. Dipper once told her that she'd caught up enough not to need any more sleep until 2018. She'd stuck out her tongue and made a  _pfbbt!_  sound, spraying him with spit.

She finally came dragging down around nine, scratching and yawning. Stan saw her and said, "Hey, Pumpkin, the Willets have taken over the kitchen. What say I drive you Greasy's for breakfast?"

"Pancakes!" Mabel said, perking up. "The kind with berries and whipped cream!"

"Sure," Stan told her.

"Let's see if Dipper wants to come."

She found Dipper in the McGucket library, but he said he had already eaten, so he thanked her and went back to reading  _Other Realms, Other Dreams,_ a collection of supposedly true stories about people who'd somehow been whisked off to strange dimensions and had returned.

Privately, he thought that the time he, Wendy, and Mabel had wound up in the dimension where people had strangely heavy and oddly proportioned bodies (even the kids had five fingers!) and Gravity Falls was only a cartoon show on TV was far more other-realmy than anything in the book.

And Stan knew that Ford was up, had eaten his usual breakfast of coffee and an orange, and had left for the Shack and his lab. Before Stan and Mabel left, though, Stan looked in on Dipper in the library and said, "Here ya go, kid!" and flipped something to him.

Dipper fielded it. "A gold nugget?" he asked, the marble-sized chunk of ore strangely heavy in his palm. "Grunkle Stan, I was joking!"

"Meh, you told me where to find it, and I got lots more!" Stan said. "So take it and don't thank me, or I'll change my mind about givin' it to ya. Catch ya later!"

He drove Mabel to Greasy's, where there was already a good crowd—Toby Determined, or "Bodacious T." as he wanted to be called these days, Chicory Wilmuth and her sister Bedelia, old maids at forty and forty-two, Road Hog in his bike leathers chatting them up, and about a dozen others at breakfast, including Sheriff Blubs and Deputy Durland, who looked to be having a meal consisting entirely of a dozen doughnuts and coffee. They all knew and greeted Stan warmly.

He and Mabel found a booth and settled in, and then Stan ordered the Merry Berry Cheery Cherry Wide-Awake Pancake breakfast for Mabel, adding on whatever she asked for ("Hash browns! Turkey bacon! Two hard-boiled eggs! Orange juice! Make that three hard-boiled eggs! Ooh, grits! What the heck are grits? Never mind, I want me some grits!" and so on). Stan stuck to another cup of coffee for himself, and Mabel had one as well, though unlike Dipper she still laced hers nearly half-and-half with milk.

Stan watched, smiling, as she plowed into the meal with her customary "nom-nom-nom" sounds. "Where do ya put all that?" he asked her. "You oughta be fat, but you look great!"

"Thank you, Basal Metabolism!" Mabel said, raising her fork high in salute.

"Oh, I like to see a girl enjoy her meal," Lazy Susan Wentworth said with a chuckle as she warmed up their coffees. "Hey, Stanley, piece of pie?"

"Nah, thanks, Susan," Stan said. "Gotta watch my waistline."

"You're looking great!" she said.

"Yeah, thanks, you're very passable yourself!"

"Oh, you!"

As Susan walked away, Stan murmured, "I still got it."

Mabel, working on the grits, nodded but did not otherwise respond.

 


	9. The Stuffing

**9\. The Stuffing**

* * *

 

The enormous meal was ready at two p.m. The twins had already watched the end of the big Thanksgiving parade on TV, had worked on deciding what they wanted, and what they wanted to give, for Christmas, had welcomed Ford back from the Mystery Shack, had greeted first Lorena and then Sheila, who had promptly vanished with Mayellen McGucket and Wanda Pines for some girl talk (" _I'm_  a girl!" Mabel complained after having been voted out of the meeting), and had gone out to wander around the big sloping backyard of the mansion.

The weather warmed up as the day went on, and by noon the temperature was up to 45. They discovered the Northwests' old croquet court and Fiddleford had found the mallets, hoops, stakes, and balls for them. They spent some time playing croquet, by Mabel's rules, since they had never played and had no idea of the real ones. It was an exciting round, though Dipper got a lump on his head from a flying ball.

Then a little before two, Mom called them to gather up everything, store it, and wash up for the big meal. Dipper put on a white shirt and borrowed a tie from Grunkle Stan, one showing a hula dancer and a palm tree. It reached nearly to his thighs, but, hey, it was festive.

Before the meal, everyone—including the Willets, who were a little flustered when Fiddleford insisted they had to join in and help eat the turkey and trimmings—sat around the table and joined hands. Fiddleford, as host, cleared his throat and said, "Well, now, I'm not prezactly a theologian, but I reckon we can all bow our heads. 'Stead of a normal grace, why don't we go 'round the table and let each person just tell what he or she's most thankful for right at the moment? Fer me, it's simple: bein' home, havin' my family, and bein' in good health again. Darlin'?"

Mayellen said in a soft voice: "I'm thankful for my husband and my son, and for finally getting to know what having a good family really means."

Next, Ford: "Well—uh. I'm thankful for knowledge and the chance to pursue it, and for the friendship of the McGuckets and for my brother and for our niece and nephew, but most especially for meeting Lorena and finding love before it was too late."

Lorena: "I'm thankful to Ford for finding me! And for this time and this place and for all of you. There's nothing anywhere like Gravity Falls, and I'm lucky I live here."

Then Sheila: "I'm thankful that I didn't decide on a teaching job after college and that I came here to live with my brother and help in his shop at a time when I had nothing. Because now I've got Stanley, and that's everything to me!"

"Aw," Stan said. "Sheila, I'd be lyin' if I didn't say I was thankful to find a woman who can put up with me! Ford, you know how thankful I am to have you back again and to be allowed to stand by your side when you have your cockamamie adventures. Wanda, Alex, I'm so thankful you let your kids come and live with me that summer. It turned my life around. Dipper, Mabel, I'm thankful for you two knuckleheads. That's enough schmaltz from me!"

Mabel said, "I'm thankful for  _everything!_ "

Dipper said, "I'm thankful for Mabel. And for Wendy, and, uh, for all my other friends here in Gravity Falls, and for Mom and Dad. I'm specially thankful for getting to know my Grunkles. You guys are the greatest."

Mr. Pines said, "I'm thankful for my family, first of all. For my wife, who keeps me on schedule, for my kids, who keep me on my toes, and for my uncles, who remind me why the Pines family is so wonderful."

Mrs. Pines said, "Well—I'm thankful for my children. I know I can be sort of a helicopter Mom, but that's just because I love you both so much."

Mr. Willet said, "I'm thankful for the chance to get to know you all. You're the kindest folks I've ever met."

Mrs. Willet said, "For me, I'm most thankful for this feeling of family. And for the food that my husband cooked. Let's eat before it gets cold!"

"A-men!" Fiddleford said, and they began the feast.

* * *

And feast they did, until even Mabel could eat no more. Then everyone chipped in to help clean up (though Fiddleford's washamajig did the dishes by evaporating the dirty ones and reconstituting them as clean) and everyone settled down to a long torpid afternoon, groaning and burping politely, or, in Mabel's case, boastfully.

About four o'clock, a tired-sounding Wendy called Dipper: "How'd it go, Dip?"

"Great," Dipper said. "But right now, I don't ever want to eat anything again."

She laughed. "Man, the most I can say is our house is still sorta in one piece after the invasion of the relatives! I do have to replace six panes of glass in the windows, but that's nothing. We even have leftovers. Gah! I gotta figure out turkey recipes for, like, a week! You guys goin' home Sunday?"

"That's the plan," he said. "Get together tomorrow?"

"You know it! S'posed to warm up some, be above freezing. Run at six o'clock?"

"I'll try to waddle along with you."

"Christmas will be better," she promised. "Your folks will go home after the wedding, and then we'll have a whole week to hang out."

"Can't wait for that. Maybe we can do something Saturday?"

"Yeah, I'd love to. Think what, and we'll see what mischief we can get into!"

Soos came around shortly after that. "Scrap drive, dawgs!" he said. "Gathering up leftovers for the Gnomes!"

"Uh—" Dipper, who had met him at the door said. "Let's say for 'the little ones,' OK? In front of Mom and Dad?"

"Gotcha!"

So Mayellen and Mom helped put together packages of leftover turkey, dressing, veggies, cranberry sauce, pies, and various other goodies. Soos, Dipper, and Mabel carried it all out to his truck, already half-full of leftovers from the Shack and from one or two other places Soos had hit up for contributions. "Thanks, guys!" Soos told the ladies. "The little ones will be real thankful for this! Gnomes get crazy hungry in the fall and wintertime!"

When Mom looked surprised, Mabel laughed. "Ah-ha-ha! Soos, you droll wag, you! You're so big you call all us littler ones Gnomes!"

"Uh—no, I don't, dawg. Do I?" Soos asked, looking puzzled. "Oh, my gosh! I gotta watch my language. Don't want to be spieciesist!"

They bundled him out of there quick. At Dipper's suggestion, Soos drove them over to Wendy's cabin, where she gladly—but clandestinely—gave them about half of the Corduroy leftovers. Fortunately, Manly Dan and her brothers were all zonked out asleep after their Gargantuan meal. Their snores sounded like bears rioting.

Soos made a few other stops, and by the time they pulled up in front of the Sawyer family's house—Dipper saw that it was twice as big as it had been, Manly Dan and Soos having cooperated in some carpentry and building expansion—the truck bed was loaded down with boxes and containers.

The Gnomes had semi-adopted the Sawyer kids a year before, and now the little red-capped guys and a few little red-capped girls, identical except for the beards, gratefully came out of the woods to accept the donations and carry them back to the Gnomes' winter burrows.

Jeff, with the badger queen of the Gnomes at his side, actually doffed his red cap, and his head was not (as Ford once posited) conical after all. "This means a lot to us," he said in a voice that nearly broke. "We have a tough time in the winter, you know. This gift means more Gnomes and their kids will make it through to a new spring."

"Dude," Soos said, "It's fair! When the weather's warm, you guys are, like, awesome pest-control experts." And that was true. Nobody in town was much bothered with mice or rats in the warm seasons. The Gnomes would eat anything.

"There'll be more," Belinda Sawyer told Jeff. "We'll do our usual food drives. You come and see us every month."

"And me and Dipper will be back at Christmas!" Mabel said. "Love to see you then! Next to Mermando, you're my favorite ex!"

Blushing and glancing sideways anxiously at the badger, Jeff said, "Ix-nay on the ex-way!" Dipper supposed that badgers, in addition to white and black stripes, must have a jealous streak.

Afterward, Dipper asked Soos to detour to the Shack on their way back to the McGuckets' house. While Mabel went to wish Waddles and Widdles a happy Thanksgiving—they had feasted on leftover pumpkin pie and looked piggily satisfied—Dipper walked out into the woods as far as the Bill Cipher effigy.

He stood beside it and, without going into the Mindscape, he said aloud, "Bill, I don't know whether you're really serious about repenting or if this is another of your tricks. I do accept that you've given up on trying to hurt us. So—Grunkle Stan gave this to me, and I'm giving it to you." He balanced the nugget on the brim of the stone Cipher's hat.

"If you really are turning over a new leaf," he said, "just leave Mabel and me alone. And our families, and Soos and his family, OK? I mean, go do good to anybody else if you can, but we kinda think you've done enough for us. No hard feelings." He sighed. "Look, we'll be back at Christmas, and I'll check in with you then. And Mom has said we can come back next summer, as usual. Until then, don't do anything too weird, OK? Keep out of trouble. And I hope you satisfy the Axolotl, whatever it is."

He had been standing with his hands in his pockets. He took them out and patted the hat. "So long for a while, nacho chip. Take care of yourself."

It was not until they got back into the seat of Soos's truck that Mabel said, "What did you do to your hand, Brobro?"

"Huh?"

Dipper stared. It looked as if someone had used marker pens. His left palm had a crude, child-like sketch on it, a lavender bird, the fingers representing its tail feathers, the thumb its neck and head.

On it was written "Hey, Pine Tree!"

And on his wrist, "Look, it's a turkey!"

"Dude," Soos said, "that's not, like, permanent, is it?"

"I hope not," Dipper said. He scrubbed and the ink smeared.

"Nope," Mabel said. "Washable. Want me to lick it off?"

"Ew, no!" Dipper said.

"Why'd you do that, dawg?" Soos said. "Just holiday spirit or some deal?"

"Uh, yeah. Something like that," Dipper muttered.

But Mabel's glance told him she knew as well has he did what the sketch meant.

Bill was back. And for good or bad, he had not finished with them yet.

* * *

_The End_

 


End file.
